Campers at Vogel enjoyed an exciting trip to SPARK! on Wednesday morning. A 501(c)(3), SPARK! aims to ignite a sense of creativity in all children, as this sense propagates higher performance in the classroom as well as the workplace. 

At SPARK!, many campers gravitated toward the giant, elevated playscape. Campers crawled through tunnels, shot down slides, and traversed across the net pathways of this play area.

I personally did not plan on going down the playground’s very tall and very steep slide, but when one of the little ones grabbed my hand and led me up the stairs toward it, I knew I couldn’t say no. After crossing the net connecting the stairs and the slide, my new friend and I both went down the slide and agreed that it was very fun. 

With another camper, I crawled into a tunnel in the wall. With this camper, I looked out of the tunnel windows to the mock ocean environment in the inner-wall space. Lights imitated the reflective nature of water, and treasure chests flanked the “ocean floor.”

At the same time, many campers were coloring butterflies on cutouts of soda cans or creative designs on plastic water bottles. On a Rube Goldberg board, campers constructed a pathway of wood planks and paper towel tubes to deliver a marble from its starting point to another box. 

Overall, at SPARK!, the campers exercised their creativity and explored a new place where they could just run around a play. The morning brimmed with laughter, smiles, and little feet wheezing by you, running to the next activity.